Fiona Clark — Polaroid Pests, 2023–2026
Fiona Clark — Plush toys collection, 1960
Fiona Clark — My Rabbit Apron for school. Made by my paternal Grandmother, Lillian Jane Ward, Inglewood NZ 1959, 1959

For more than fifty years, Fiona Clark has documented the communities of which she forms part. Here, that community extends beyond people to the plants and animals with whom she shares the land. The Polaroids presented here record rabbits, possums, feral cats and other introduced animals shot on her property in Taranaki, Aotearoa New Zealand, as part of Clark’s long-term efforts to regenerate indigenous ecosystems. Each image is annotated with the place, date and circumstances of the animal’s death, giving the archive the precision of a field record. In the neighbouring vitrine are soft toys drawn from the many collections Clark has assembled in the former dairy factory where she lives and works. Among them is the rabbit apron she wore as a child, kept as part of the vast collections of teapots, crockery, magazines, hairdryers and other everyday objects she has assembled over a lifetime.

Fiona Clark’s photographic practice is rooted in long-term relationships grounded in collaboration and care. Her images attend to communities and environments often excluded from mainstream visibility, tracing lives, histories and forms of belonging across different contexts. Through a documentary approach, she considers how bodies, lands and identities are shaped within wider systems of value. Her photographs examine the effects of extractive economies on everyday life, while remaining closely connected to community histories, activism and the cultural memory of marginalised groups in Aotearoa New Zealand.